In order to meet Federal Regulations, Bavaria raised headlight heights on BMW 2002’s by inserting 19 mm aluminum spacers between the strut upper support bearings and the fender in the front and by replacing the 28 mm upper rubber damper rings with 38 mm rings in the rear.
Want to put your BMW down where it belongs? Follow these instructions.
Lowering the Front:
- Loosen the wheel lugs, jack up the front of the car and position on jack stands, then remove the wheels.
- Unbolt the brake caliper and hang it up out of the way, taking care not to put strain on the brake lines.
- Disconnect the sway bar from the transverse control arm.
- Remove the three nuts from the strut upper support bearing.
- Lower the entire strut assembly until you can remove the aluminum spacer.
- Reassemble the front suspension in the reverse order, placing the spacer on the top of the wheel arch for added strength. You may wish to paint the spacer with rustproof paint to make it look better and to prevent disintegration.
- Check toe in.
Lowering the Rear:
- Determine what will be replacing the 38 mm rubber spacers, which have three dots on the side. 35 mm dampers have two dots, 28 mm dampers have a single dot, and 24 mm dampers have no dots.
- Loosen the wheel lugs, jack up the rear of the car and position on jack stands, and remove the wheels.
- Unbolt the halfshaft from the stub axle (six bolts).
- Disconnect the sway bar links from the trailing arms.
- Support the trailing arm with a jack and unbolt the top of the shock absorber in the trunk.
- Carefully lower the jack and trailing arm until the spring is free.
- Remove the damper ring, noting its orientation with the spring, and replace with a thinner ring. Ensure that the ends of the spring are located in the rings properly and that the groove in the lower ring mates with the bump on the trailing.arm.
- Reassemble in the reverse order, using blue Loctite and the proper torque on the half-shaft bolts.
- Aim your headlights, since they will be much lower now.
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